CS Weekly Archive > From the Trenches > 8/08/08

"Just Keep Writing":
Red's Stephen Susco

By elizabeth rivera

Stephen Susco (The Grudge) takes a break from his kid and his writing to chat with CS Weekly about his adaptation of Jack Ketchum's novel, Red.

Stephen Susco's latest film, Red, tells the tale of Avery Ludlow, a man out for justice after his dog is cruelly murdered by a couple of rebellious teenagers. Stephen Susco adapted the script from Jack Ketchum's novel, and as he prepared for the movie's release this weekend, he chatted with CS Weekly about the process of adapting a novel, telling a simple story well, and how the answer to your problem is to always keep writing.

How did you get involved with this project. Were you familiar with the novel?
I read the book. I thought it was more of a horror book, based on the cover. I was not familiar with Jack's work, and I picked it up and expected something efficiently pulpy. It wasn't the book I thought it was going to be. It was this gut-wrenching, slow-burn, dramatic thriller. It's a very short book. I read it four or five times in a row and said this is something I really want to do. I called the publisher, tracked down the agent, and a producer had literally just snatched up the rights a few weeks before.

I'd been doing studio work for awhile and was trying to do more independent projects. The first one I got involved in was actually The Grudge, and that, over time, turned from an independent film to being an independent/studio film. In early 2003, when it was starting to become more of a studio film, I was like, well, now I want to find that other independent project. I read Red at the perfect time. I chased down the producer who bought the rights and he said, "We've been talking to another guy, another writer-director." I said, "Who is it?" He said, "Lucky McKee." And I said, "Oh, I love Lucky McKee." We all teamed up on it. We were all passionate about finding a way to get this project on. I developed a script under Lucky's supervision and became a producer on the project. So, it all kind of started five and a half years go.

What was your process for adapting the novel?
My process was basically not to screw it up. It's a really short novel and it's a really good novel. Everything is very clean and clear. Every time you read it, you pick up another level. There's a lot of stuff working below the surface. I wanted to figure out how to hit some of those thematic elements that Jack was getting at without making them too obvious and keeping a lot of the subtlety of the book. There were a couple of things in the book that I didn't like. There are two primary things I wanted to change, but other than that, the book was my road flare. I stayed as true to the novel as I could.

What elements from the novel appealed to you, and which ones did you know would have to be changed in order for it to be a screenplay? How did you know when to stick to the book or veer off in your own direction?
You have to follow your gut. One of the biggest back and forths we had was that in the book, right after the sequence with the reporter where she gets called off the case by her boss, they go out to that bar and end up having sex. That was a big sticking point for me. I thought, here's a guy who's living in the memory of his wife, and so much of the dog and the story is wrapped up in his wife. They're the last symbols he has of his marriage. So, for him to just go out and screw a reporter might take away some of that sympathy. We tried it my way and we tried it Lucky's way, and actually we had it in the movie right up until very late in the process. At the very last second, everybody said, "We think maybe you're right, let's take it out."

One I was wrong on was, I wanted to do more with the war. But I think I put a little too much emphasis on that, and the director wisely pulled back some of those details so that they wouldn't clutter the movie. There were a lot of little things. It's always a challenge, because you want to be faithful, but at a certain point you gotta look at what's essential to the truth the author is trying to convey.

Even though this story is radically different from The Grudge, it's still rather dark in places. How did you balance the darkness with the puppies?
It's interesting, in a number of reviews I've seen online people usually take me to task for putting the puppies in at the end, and the reality is they're in the book. That actually wasn't me. My whole take on that was that you know there's the five stages of loss, and there's always a stage that's been missing. I don't think you're out until you can love again or until you can risk loss again. So, the idea of him taking possession of a puppy at the end became significant, because he was going to open himself up to loss again. Losing Red at the beginning of the movie brought him right back to losing his son and his wife. So for him to then embrace another creature in his house, even though he knows there is going to be loss on one end or the other, is important because it says that he has now finally overcome everything.

Red is a simple, moving story. Were there any themes from the novel or from your own ideas that you especially wanted to explore?
One of the reasons I reacted so well to the novel was because these are thing that I'm always kind of grappling with. The very first script I ever wrote when I was a freshman in college was about vigilante justice. It was loosely based on one thing that happened to me and one thing that happened to someone I knew. It was an attempt to try to work it out in my head, because I didn't have any answer for it. So, when I read Red, it kind of hit that nerve again. It was something that was already near and dear to my heart, and what I liked about the book is that it raised a lot of questions without giving any answers. No one gives you a lecture. No one says, "You know, Av, you did the right thing." Truth is very muddy, and the truth is very gray, and the truth is that there is no easy answer. I respect Jack for the boldness of his writing, and that's a cornerstone of his writing. He's a very bold guy, and he's not afraid of putting things out there. Ideally, people will leave the film and go have a cup of coffee and won't exactly agree. There will be people who say, "He pushed it too far," and people who say, "He didn't do enough." Those are always the most interesting films. The ones that don't spoon feed you the easy answer, and I'm glad all of us as a unit were of the same mind when it came to that, of keeping the waters muddy and not telling anyone how they supposed to feel about what they just experienced .

You've got a movie here that features dogs and a quaint, small town. How do you avoid stumbling into clichés or things we've seen before when these are elements that have been used so many times before in films and fiction?
I think it's a testament to the two directors. The story certainly has familiar components, but I think the manner in which the film is told is unique, it's very measured. There's an elegant simplicity to the way the film is constructed. It takes it's time. It doesn't really build artifice. Other people who've seen the movie might say, "You're full of shit," but I think everyone wanted to not make the story overcomplicated because it's not an overcomplicated question. There are very simple questions, even though the answers are difficult. The question is simple: what would you do? And again, I credit Lucky because what they were able to do is present these questions in a very measured, restrained way. It's a story the directors told very well, and beyond that, I don't know how we avoided clichés. I totally credit those guys.

What is your number one rule for successful screenwriting?
Oh my god, that is the hardest question I think I've ever been asked. Do you mean the business side or the creative side?

Why don't you give me one for each?
On the creative side, write a lot. That would be the number one thing. It helps against writer's block. It helps against ideas you might be getting stuck on. It helps with discipline. It helps with when the business side of things gets crazy, when you get frustrated and want to pack up and leave town. Just write. Close the door and write and make it a regular, daily part of your life. There's a lot of things I've learned, but that would certainly be the number one thing, because I find that simply writing will get you through most of the trouble you're going to encounter. People often consider screenwriters to be the most mistreated people and the most unlucky people in Hollywood, and I do not subscribe to that at all. I think that screenwriters are almost in the best position, because we're the only ones who can go home, close the door, and create a script to set up another movie. Everybody needs scripts, and writers can write them. I'm not saying it's an easy business, and I'm not saying we're not treated oftentimes very disrespectfully, but we do have the luxury of being able to turn off the phone and go home and write another one, and we're fortunate for that.

The number one rule on the business side? It could be write a lot also, because it's a tough business. The Grudge was my 25th script. Before then, I'd had two or three movies greenlit that had stars and start dates and money flow but never got made. I had projects in various stages. Projects that got lost in endless development . It's an interesting system, and on the business side of things, again, the best way to get serious sometimes is to keep your head down and be writing multiple projects, because that way when one of your projects ends up in a weird place, you still have options. You can't just sit and wait for it, because years could go by. You have to keep working. You gotta keep refining what you do, and you gotta keep creating opportunities for more projects. That is the universal answer for me. That's the elixir. Just keep writing.

Elizabeth Rivera is a freelance writer (e.g. poor person) who lives in Los Angeles. She can usually be found roaming the streets of the greater L.A. area looking for story material and general mischief.

Stephen Susco, Red courtesy Magnolia Pictures

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